Option Agreements

What on earth are "Option Agreements"? They're used by unscrupulous house buying companies and they're things you really need to watch out for.

An Option Agreement gives a company the option to buy your house at a pre-agreed price, but not the obligation to.

This means a company can agree a price with you (say, for 85% of the market value) and then put it on the market and try and sell it for 100% of the market value.

If they succeed then they make a 15% commission! If they don't succeed... It's not really their problem. They just walk away from the transaction and leave you without a sale.

These are great for companies: They get the upside of being a house buying company (the bigger margins) as well as the upside of being an estate agent (no risk). Of course, this only works because you get the downside of both. You get the lower price, and you also get no certainty or fast sale.

They're nasty agreements which are often mis-sold and renamed "purchase agreements" to get people to sign them.

The advice is as simple as this: Never sign anything with a house-buying company.